Wednesday, October 05, 2011

Here is a photo of me in Amsterdam lamenting that reality is based on space and time.

Or is it... ?

I recovered from the recent hospital stuff and now my European tour 2011 is well and truly on. The first date is in Nijmegen, Netherlands (where I am writing this) tomorrow at 7 pm. The info for tomorrow's date is at this link.

The next stop will be Bonn, Germany on Saturday at the San Bo Dojo. That will be a day-long zazen thing. This will be followed by another day-long zazen thing on Sunday (the next day) in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Info for that and for the talk I'm giving in Rotterdam the following day (Monday) is at this link.

This is the second European Zen tour I've done. I'm gradually becoming familiar with how Zen is perceived over here. It's a bit newer to Europe than it is to the United States. That is to say, Zen literature got to both places around the same time. But it seems like the establishment of actual practice centers lagged a little behind the US.

The largest Zen organization in Europe appears to be AZI, which stands for Association Zen Internationale. This was established in France by a Japanese monk named Deshimaru. Deshimaru and my teacher Nishijima Roshi were friends. Even so, I've never been invited to speak at an AZI center. I think they're very particular about having only people from their lineage speak at their places. Fair enough.

Noah Levine has authorized a few teachers to start Against The Stream groups over here. And I'm speaking at a couple of their places in The Netherlands. Noah isn't a Zen teacher. But he's "Zen friendly." I've spoken at a number of the places he established in the US, Canada and now Europe.

Over in Poland and Finland, where I spoke last year, Philip Kapleau established a few centers that are still active. Kapleau was the author of the highly influential book Three Pillars of Zen.

The San Francisco Zen Center has a couple things over here, I think. But they run their organization pretty loosely. When a teacher from SFZC leaves, she or he usually establishes a place that has no official ties to San Francisco. However, the centers they establish all seem to network quite closely with each other. The only place I've been to in Europe that was started by an SFZC teacher is the Black Mountain Zen Centre in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

There are a number of other teachers over here on the continent. One of those I met last year was a Dutch guy named Ton Lathouwers. He was a fun and funny guy. He studied with Masao Abe.

All of the foregoing doesn't tell you much about the overall state of Zen in Europe. And it's hard to say with any authority what that is. I've encountered a number of very sincere practitioners working hard at making Zen available. It's not all good news, though. Genpo Roshi is quite active here in The Netherlands. But his influenced has waned considerably lately. It's hard to tell if that's just because of the very highly publicized and largely meaningless sex scandal or because people realized what a joke the whole Big Mind® thing was.

New Age stuff is as much a booming business in Europe as it is in America. This stuff always has a kind of run-off effect upon Zen. New Age book shops usually stock a few Zen books. Which is good in that it gets the written part of Zen out there. But one wonders if purchasers just combine all that stuff in their minds into one big eastern spirituality blob the way Americans tend to.

I'll be seeing a lot more Zen in Europe over the coming six weeks. I'll let you know what I find.

Noah Levine has authorized a few teachers to start Against The Stream groups over here.

That's a bit odd to me. Nothing against the guy personally; it just seems a bit unusual for a 40 year old guy to be "authorizng teachers," especially ones geographically separated by substantial distance.

The initial impetus for developing a classification of mental disorders in the United States was the need to collect statistical information. The first official attempt was the 1840 census which used a single category, "idiocy/insanity". In 1917, a Committee on Statistics from what is now known as the American Psychiatric Association (APA), together with the National Commission on Mental Hygiene, developed a new guide for mental hospitals called the "Statistical Manual for the Use of Institutions for the Insane", which included 22 diagnoses. This was subsequently revised several times by APA over the years. APA, along with the New York Academy of Medicine, also provided the psychiatric nomenclature subsection of the US medical guide, the Standard Classified Nomenclature of Disease, referred to as the "Standard".

Of course the granularity has been greatly refined so that we now have(IQ based)50-69, Moron. 20-49, Imbecile. Below 20, Idiot.

And insanity classified in a variety of definitions: Classification of Insanity as Adopted by the State Lunacy Commission in Force Since July 1, 1908. Many of these previously insane behaviors are now considered personality disorders or republicanism.

301.92 Authoritarian Personality Disorder: A pervasive pattern of power abuse marked by the compulsion to control others and nullify their civil rights while glorifying one's own imagined societal role, usually indicated by at least nine (or more) of the following behavior traits: MORE

Once in a great while, someone is born normal, raised with skilled parenting, and reaches maturity without all the baggage associated in the modern world (e.g. a Pacific Islander).

"Sex is not the scandal --- it is the manipulation and lying that creates the scandal."

Thank You!!! You've nailed very neatly and concisely what it is I've been saying for years (it seems so simple now, I almost feel like an imbecile [IQ of, say, 25) for not articulating it sooner).

I don't have a problem with sex. People--even "Zen Masters" or other spiritual leaders--can have all the sex they want, as far as I'm concerned, and doesn't reflect negatively on their teachings or morals...as long as they're honest and open and not taking advantage of their position. Ikkyu fucked all the damned time, and he seems like a pretty admirable dude, besides that. But he never denied being a horn dog, and he didn't go around manipulating others or his situation to get his nookie.

A few weeks ago, I made the decision that I am no longer going to be watching MMA (or football, or boxing, or kickboxing).

It was very difficult for me to come to this decision, because MMA has not just been my favorite sport for as long as I can remember; it has also been my biggest interest and passion in life for as long as I can remember. The sport of MMA has been what I often go to bed thinking about, it has been what I've written about for years, it has given me something to look forward to during many tough times, and it has been the sport that I've defended to any of my friends or family who oppose it. I know that no longer watching MMA is going to leave a void in my life, and that no longer watching football, boxing, or kickboxing is going to be easy by comparison.

Very few days have gone by over these many years during which I haven't either read about, or written about, or watched MMA, and for good reason: The technique involved in MMA, the fact that a fighter can employ dozens of different strategies and try to go about winning in so many different ways, the fact that all of those strategies have counter-strategies (and those counters have counters), the fact that there are so many different ways to win... These are the things that have always made me feel that MMA is the most exciting sport in the world to watch.

At the same time, I know that I can't watch it anymore, and I'd like to explain what led to my decision to no longer watch the sport that I've loved so much for so many years.

I recently watched a segment on an episode of the HBO newsmagazine "Real Sports" that I had saved on Tivo. The segment was about a peer-reviewed scientific study that links brain injuries such as concussions to ALS (and to syndromes like ALS), which is probably the single worst way for a human being to (slowly and painfully) die.

After watching this segment, I went online and started reading. And reading. And reading. I read about concussions for hours and hours, then for the better part of a couple days. (One of the many, many articles that I found was one on Sherdog.com, written by Dr. Matt Pitt on the subject of brain injuries in MMA)

While of course everyone has known for years that concussions are "bad for you" in general, the scientific community has only begun to fully understand the wide scope of the long-term consequences of concussions in the past few years. Studies have recently been conducted on the brains of dead football players, boxers, and pro wrestlers. Many of these athletes lived long enough to finish their careers, but nowhere near a normal life expectancy, and the alarming trend in the studies of these athletes' brains is that they had brain damage that was far worse than anyone suspected or could have imagined.

-Fighters are generally paid a certain amount of money to step in the cage/ring and fight, and a certain amount of money as a "win bonus" if they are victorious. These two amounts are usually the same (example: $4,000 to fight and $4,000 more if you win), but not always.

-Fighters who are drug-tested before an event (which includes all fighters who compete in championship bouts) are only paid 90% of their purse until the results of their drug tests are in. At that point, they are sent the remaining 10% of their purse, assuming that they passed the drug tests.

-If any given fighter has not had MRI and MRA tests on their brain within the past five years, they have to get those tests done at their own expense, with the price usually being $425.

-All of the salaries below are before taxes are taken by the government, and these taxes are much higher if you are not a US citizen.

For each of the three events listed below, we will list the salaries for each fighter (including their "show money" and "win money"), followed by some analysis on the salaries of each event.

With all the fuss surrounding Amazon's new tablet, The Kindle Fire it is good news to find that the company are still putting their weight behind the eInk Kindle reader. Jeff Brazos, Amazon CEO, stated that it is still day one for the dedicated eReaders of which the Kindle leads the field and that the eReader will continue to be updated alongside the Kindle Fire - the latter device is more of an all round tablet computer while the Kindle is a dedicated reader and there is room for both.

The excellent Kindle Chronicles Podcast this week carried a great and informative report from Amazon's press conferance held in New York this past week, and is essential listening for anyone interested in the future of reading.

As I heard the story, a biology doctoral student was meeting with his dissertation committee when one of his professors asked him this question: “How can you tell if something is alive?” The doctoral student, as is the practice when going through that tortuous process, gave a long and technical answer. The professor said, “Well, yeah, but that’s not what I’m looking for.” Undaunted, the student gave an even longer and more technical answer, to which the professor replied, “You’re not wrong, but you’re not right either.” The student paused for a bit before giving the most dazzling technical answer that he could, and the professor just frowned and shook her head. “I’m sorry,” said the exasperated student, “just what answer are you looking for?” She smiled at her overly hard working student and said, “You can tell something is alive because it grows.” The student proceeded to smack himself in the forehead, “D’oh!”

Let’s extrapolate that story a bit. Q: How can you tell you are on the Buddhist Path? A: Because you grow on it. Just as it is the essential nature of a living being to grow, so to is it our essential nature to move toward our inherent Buddha nature by following the Path marked by our vows and precepts. Essentially, then, the Path is a one-way street moving only in the direction of a non-destination. Thus at any point on the Path you should be able to look back and see from where you have come. The distance between (non)there and (non)here is how much you have grown.

Let’s extrapolate a little further.Q: Is Treeleaf alive?A: Yes, because it is growing. Growth in this case can be the number of people joining the sangha and/or increasing complexity within the sangha. I don’t know what the membership numbers are, or even how we might want to measure them (those admitted or those that post or whatever), but certainly more and more people find out about it, and the forum has become much more complex in all its sub-forums over the years. Having been here for a few years now, it is easy to see where we were and compare it to where we are now, to see how we’ve grown.

Now let’s take one more extrapolation and jump to the idea that, since Treeleaf is a sort of living being that is on the Path, then we might also be able to consider it as a collective mind. Taking this view of Treeleaf-mind, us individuals could be seen as separate brain cells or areas of this mind, each with our own function, each cooperating (sometimes messily) with the others in order to function as a unit. Evidence supporting this analogy can be seen all through the forum. This place works! But just as our brain (or life) works, it can be chaotic and even dysfunctional at times. Change happens, growth is inevitable, and sometimes that makes us feel awkward and gets us off balance, but equilibrium always returns.

Let me see how far I can push this. Just as it is the nature of an individual’s brain to generate a thought that inevitably leads to more thoughts and then thoughts on top of those thoughts, so to does Treeleaf-mind generate threads consisting of posts upon posts upon forum posts. As individuals, we learn to watch that process and let it go during zazen, so can we learn to do the same as a collective mind? When a thread ends, does that mean Treeleaf-mind goes back to collective zazen? Can we as Treeleaf-mind develop a collective “self” awareness that exists from moment to moment? Is Treeleaf-mind moving toward some sort of collective realization of our perfect Buddha nature? Is Treeleaf even conscious of its own existence as “mind”? And so on to other questions that might arise and pile up from the one thought that I started with.

I get exasperated with this place from time to time and need to get away from it. I get critical and think that we are too attached to our Treeleaf-mind “thoughts” to let them go so that we can move on to see the bigger picture that Zen teaches us about. Again, just read through the forum for evidence of this. But I’ve just realized that when I criticize Treeleaf I am also criticizing myself, because I am part of this living/growing organism. Maybe my aggravations with Treeleaf are really just displaced aggravations with my “self.” I could leave, I suppose, but what would that mean? Since I am part of Treeleaf-mind (btw, Treeleafer, so are you), where could I go? How can I escape my own mind, Treeleaf or otherwise? Why would I? At best, I can just step back and let go for a time. What about you? Can you let go of Treeleaf, of Treeleaf-mind? The true sangha is immeasurably bigger than Treeleaf, you know.

I’d like to say DON’T think about any of this, that nothing good can come from any more thinking about this convolution I have presented here, but it is the nature of this collective mind we call Treeleaf to think and post those thoughts. So, instead, let me just ask you to let go of your posts, here or anywhere, now and always, as you/me/us/we move forward on this living/growing Path. I am going to do my part in this by smacking myself in the forehead and saying “D’oh!” as soon as I submit this my 1000th post.

"This is an interesting spin," said Stern reading from the article on Wednesday. "‘Conan’s ratings are down, but he’s huge online. Turner’s New Pitch to Advertisers Touts Late Night Host’s Web Popularity.’ That means he’s probably about three months away from being fired…This sounds like a Hail Mary last ditch attempt. There’s no hope…It just reminds me of when we were at NBC and Soupy [Sales] had his show and Soupy would get on and go ‘We’re number one in the cars!’…Like, maybe some guy at NBC said to him: ‘Don’t worry Soupy! You’re number one in the cars!’ trying to give him a pep talk or something—and then they cancelled him. They fired him.”

I have been a serious lay practioner of Zen for not quite two years -- not very long, I grant you. I originally got into it around the time of other profound changes -- moving out of an unsatisfactory marriage after 13 years, quitting the habit of abusing alcohol, feeling absolutely marvelous for the first time in years. I had long had the vague idea that some sort of meditation practice would be beneficial, so I visited a zendo of the Soto/Rinzai lineage, and adhered to it immediately. I attend the zendo regularly, and meet with my teacher privately every week -- daisan, as it's called. I study koans. I sit every day, and participate in extended sittings several times a year -- i.e., doing little other than meditating all day, all weekend, or all week. This is what serious practitioners do.

Why do this? I don't know. There is much that I find appealing in Buddhist thought generally, and in Zen Buddhism in particular. The basic ideas -- such as impermanence, the ubiquity of human suffering and its causes -- make sense to my rational mind. And I am convinced -- as it is well established -- that meditation itself provides meaningful benefits to mental and physical health.

On a more intuitive, visceral level, I am powerfully drawn to the idea that all the wisdom you will ever need is already within you. You have only to still what Master Lin-chi calls the ceaselessly seeking mind -- methodically, patiently, relentlessly -- to come to an understanding of nothing less than the essential nature of reality. If you think about it -- no, if you contemplate it -- you have to say, of course! How can it be otherwise?

Wait -- says who? Mister Buddha, the dude credited with launching the whole program? A multi-thousand year succession of masters and disciples and adherents? So? What if they are nuts? What if they are full of shit? Can anyone prove this stuff to be true in any credible, objective way? No, I think not. This is where the F-word comes into play: faith. Some call it trust. Whatever you call it, I sometimes have a big problem with it

This is an example of what they call Great Doubt and it is very much part of the program, according to what I have been taught. Doubt is encouraged. Doubt is your friend. The Buddha said, don't take my word for it. See for yourself. But it's still doubt and can be disconcerting, disquieting, distressing -- all kinds of dis-words.

Do you say, you are crashing and burning because you trying to approach rationally something that works below the level of rational mind? Maybe so. But rational mind is something we need to carry around with us to function and survive, and for the most part it's a good and helpful thing. Common sense -- prudence, if you will -- urges caution before investing decades of your life and incalculable amounts of energy and sacrifice in something this weird. Sometimes when I listen to one of the teachers speaking about such things as Zen and Reality and the One Absolute Truth, my inner voice tells me I might as well be listening to the demented ramblings of a lunatic. One of these teachers has said that Zen is and always will be a minority practice because it is such hard work. Gee, could it be that it's a minority practice because it's crazy, and most ordinary unenlightened dumbass people are too sensible for it?

In my great arrogance and psychospiritual immaturity, I have other problems with this Zen stuff. I am about as unspiritual as a person can be. You might even say anti-spiritual. For this devout atheist, the very word spiritual often sounds uncomfortably like agnostic code for religious. I'm all for bowing to people, but I think bowing to statues is silly, and do it only to go along with the crowd.

At a weekend sesshin just the other day my samu task was to clean the bathroom. As I was dilligently wiping the mirror my unmindful mind suddenly noticed something absurd. Here we are, a group of some 40 more or less privileged, educated white people from New York City, and we are paying to sweep floors, wash dishes and take out the garbage. What do you suppose people who actually clean bathrooms for a living would think? It is a ridiculously pretentious and comical affectation.

Sometimes I wonder what the hell I am doing here, and entertain fantasies of rising from the mat in the middle of a sitting period and walking out of the zendo, never to return.

But I don't. Instead I sit when it's time to sit, walk when it's time to walk, chant when it's time to chant, eat when it's time to eat. And when Sensei gave a talk this past weekend about how we were at sesshin to realize Nothing, the tears started coming out of my eyes and would not stop. Go figure.

Those caring for him at a Hindu monastery in Wales say he symbolizes the sanctity of all life and is an inspiration to templegoers. Officials say he could have a contagious disease and should be put down.

Now the fate of Shambo, the sacred bull, is in the hands of Welsh justice.

The 6-year-old Friesian bull tested positive for bovine tuberculosis in April. Under British law, animals suspected of carrying the disease must be slaughtered. But Shambo's caretakers at Skanda Vale Hindu monastery near Carmarthen, in southwest Wales, backed by worldwide supporters, say Shambo is not sick and have been fighting to save him.

The temple brought its case before the Cardiff Civil Justice Center on Thursday, arguing that their religious rights were being violated. Judge Gary Hickinbottom said he would rule on Shambo's case on Monday.

After a notice in early May that regional authorities intended to have Shambo slaughtered, the bull was isolated in a hay-filled shrine in the monastery's main temple. An Internet petition was launched, and the temple created a blog listing Shambo's daily thoughts, paired with a live Web cam dubbed "Moo Tube."

Shambo is one of a herd of cows at a 115-acre estate belonging to the monastery, also known as the Community of the Many Names of God.

The monastery has fiercely defended the animal, arguing that the tuberculosis test was inconclusive and that, even if Shambo were sick, he could be treated rather than killed.

The Welsh rural development minister, Jane Davidson, argued that the tuberculosis tests were accurate in 99.9 percent of all cases and that even healthy looking cattle might be sick or even contagious.

"I have ... considered extremely carefully whether the rights of the community to manifest their religion should override the duty on me to protect animal and human health," she said in a letter to the Welsh Assembly last month. "In the light of the veterinary, medical and legal assessments, I am minded to conclude that they should not."

The monastery said in a Web statement that its members would be "willing to defend his life with our own."

Another Hindu leader urged understanding on both sides.

"If there is good evidence of a genuine case of tuberculosis, which is then a danger to others, ... then you have to let go," said Anil Bhanot, the general secretary of Hindu Council UK. "It is the body that is dying, not the atma (soul) - that is not perishable."

The Mantrayana. The word mantrayana means sacred recitation vehicle. The school's major centers are in the Himalayan regions, in Mongolia, and in Japan. The Japanese call it Shingon. Mantrayana Buddhism accepts most Mahayanan doctrines. But it also emphasizes a close relationship between a spiritual leader, sometimes called a guru, and a small group of disciples. The disciples spend much time reciting spells called mantras, performing sacred dances and gestures, and meditating. Some branches of the school, particularly in Tibet, stress sexual symbolism and believe that sex should be used for holy purposes. Many followers of Mantrayana Buddhism believe in terrifying devils, goblins, and other deities. Attempts to visualize these deities, and the use of magic, play a large part in the school's teachings and rituals.

John 15:5-8 “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned. If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.”

Note: Only disciples of Jesus Christ produce lasting good in the world.

Given the current range of shows starring on Broadway, it's a shame that more people can't tune in by some means such as cable TV or the Internet. This has always been one of Broadway's best and worst features. Its limitations of being in a single city and on a single stage keep it special in the sense that only so many people get to witness some of the best shows on the planet. However, this is also, obviously, a bit unfortunate, as so many millions of people are missing out on these stunning performances. However, this issue has come into sharper focus in the past season particularly for fans of the hit comedy central animated series South Park.

South Park is, and has for years now been one of TV's most popular shows, to the point that those who follow it often do so almost religiously. As a result of this, many of these fans are actually also fans of Matt Stone and Trey Parker, who created the show and have also had a number of other creative endeavors over the years (such as the movies BASEketball and Team America: World Police). In fact, despite their tendency to be rather inappropriate and offensive, it is almost difficult not to be drawn to the satirical genius of these two men if you ever give their shows or movies a shot. However, many of their biggest fans have been frustrated over the course of the last six months, because Matt and Trey now have a hit Broadway musical‚ The Book Of Mormon‚ which a lot of people are unable to see.

that's the sort of thing you should be doing too anonymous, relax your contracted existance so you can handle more open-ness in your life and not throw spaz attacks everytime you come across something that forcibly contradicts your mistaken views of which apprently there is no shortage !

The AZI is rather cultist in its functionning. They constantly refer to Sawaki Kodo in their writings and speeches but always carefully avoid to do what he did. Or rather, carefully do what he was opposed to.

As for Deshimaru, he is now a "dead master" to whom one can attribute whatsoever opinion one should want in order to reinforce their power.

I think european zen differs a bit from american zen (or better: the surroundings of zen may differ). The only talks i know are kusen during zazen or teisho, a special kind of talk hold by the lineage teacher concerning a sutra or a buddhist text. Perhaps you don't get invited for talks to the AZI or other zen organisations in europe because the tradition of holding talks is not very widespread in european zen organisations. Perhaps this is a more american thing or something for zen groups without direct teacher?Beside the AZI there is also the Zen-Vereinigung Deutschland e.V. ( www.zazen.de ), teaching in Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands. The main teacher of the Zen-Vereinigung is Ludger Tenryu Tenbreul, a disciple of Taisen Deshimaru Roshi and Narita Shuyu Roshi, both students of Sawaki Kodo Roshi.Deshimaru Roshi who brought zen practice to europe is some kind of european Shunryu Suzuki.

Would you guys/guy get off an3drew's back? Who cares how many times he posts or what he writes about.. The guy is a breath of non-poisoness air in my opinion. He writes well and isn't constantly telling us what we already know or whose fault it is with Wiki links provided. There are worse things in the world than An3drew.

My dutiful, obedient Japanese wife goes "by the book" and if the book sez vitals @ 6 a.m. ...

munching 5 grain cereal and awaiting the beginning of a webinar*.

*Short for Web-based seminar, a presentation, lecture, workshop or seminar that is transmitted over the Web.

A key feature of a Webinar is its interactive elements -- the ability to give, receive and discuss information. Contrast with Webcast, in which the data transmission is one way and does not allow interaction between the presenter and the audience.

Kobun Chino was Job's zen teacher at the Los Altos Zen Center in the 1970s. He is credited for telling Steve to start Apple rather than becoming a Zen monk. Good Advice. He married Steve and his wife Laurene in 1991.

"there's too many half baked men and women floating about on the net, unless you have a way of filtering these types they latch onto anything of quality and home in to destroy it with their inanity and stupidity

unless you have some way of filtering these out, and actually i have to say the obverse usually occurs, these people are encouraged to dominate most message boards

and whats more, once they have reduced a message board to their level, they get tired of the board and their own ongoing ill health and scout further afield for fresh pasture on which to spread their toxic manure"

....

"if i get banned or prevented from posting then the moderators/owner are only doing me a favour because i post too much anyway and censored boards get very distorted, carrying the board participants into a maelstrom of maladaptiveness"

Funfinity: The reason why an3drew understands parasitic spammers is because he recognizes those qualities in himself. His writing is all self-description. That is why it is so negatively critical. He has something he needs to tell himself. No one should take any of what he says personally. It's not about you.

anonymous anonymous: The reason why mysterion understands parasitic spammers is because he recognizes those qualities in himself. His writing is all self-description. That is why it is so negatively critical. He has something he needs to tell himself. No one should take any of what he says personally. It's not about you.

A little joke.

An3drews autistic. Let's Take it into consideration without treating him like an alien.

"It is very important to experience the complete negation of yourself, which brings you to the other side of nothing. People experience that in many ways. You go to the other side of nothing, and you are held by the hand of the absolute. You see yourself as part of the absolute, so you have no more insistence of self as yourself. You can speak of self as no-self upon the absolute. Only real existence is absolute."

well i was hoping that putting a pic up would not be forgable, but apparently the guy who is obsessively spamming took the trouble to capture the pic and attach it somehow to a void profile !

the only way to tell for sure is to click on the name and see that it's a valid profile !

michel, read the old zen stories, are you real or one of these flakey "No REPLY" monks ?

there is just one main anonymous poster, the one with the extreme spam and forgery, he's going to a lot of trouble with me,i should feel flattered i guess that i write so well that he feels obliged to go to so much trouble to spoil it !

he actually seems quite taken with what i'm writing and maybe it's sinking in a tiny bit and this obstructive spamming is a form of processing by him

oppositional defiant ?

i did set up my own blogs because i can't see the situation changing here so should move across to it i guess

i actually think someone like michel proulx is much more of a cotcase than the spammer because of the complete intellectual dishonesty !

there's no such thing and to write like that speaks an alienated condition, however i can see by your references you are reading a bit of my writing and i guess for you this is your way of processing so i don't grudge it, you are certainly making progress

understanding is not instant, literally a life time of serious work, but you need what makes it worthwhile, that seeing and being of infinity and buddha which is really just a case of recognizing it and valuing it !

magnesium is actually something that you should focus on, rather than stontium. don't trust my forger. he has some limited information on paleo dieting but is a twat overall. i recommend magnesium citrate. 400 mg/day oughta do.

good question, i have thought about what i am going to say and really it's one of those things, you won't understand until you have had a real vision so i am not going to talk about it

you also need to understand what a vision is which is a direct communcation by infinity or buddha to you so it's an exceptional event to exceptional people, i.e. those few who can see and accept their own crucifixion for infinity : o )

1. You must think yourself lean and thin, and strong and healthy...to a proper regulation of hunger and satiation. There is no prescription or proscription that will necessarily work for you. You must write your own "diet and fitness book" from your own trial and error experience.

2. Thinking and principles rule. Applications must be tested and critically evaluated. One-size-fits-all plans and roadmaps are doomed to mediocrity, at best. Your best has to come from you.

3. Humans are animals. Moreover, the same sorts of physiology, biology, climatology, geology and sociology that holds sway over the life, death and prosperity of the entirety of the animal world applies just as soundly to humans.

4. Humans, unlike other animals, can consciously act against their own best interest. They can also command nature and their environment to a degree other animals can't and don't. Think fire breaks, dams, roads, cities, suburbs, airports, skyscrapers, division of labor and trade.

5. Human ill health, unhappiness, sexlessness, sleeplessness, stress, slavery, drudgery, suicide, and disease are adverse manifestations of the human ability to work against his own interest: his ability to produce, and his ability to command nature taken to irrational levels.

6. The ability of humans to work against themselves and their own nature so effectively is the root cause of all human-created problems. The ability to "create reality" by marvelous human minds exacerbates the downside on many levels when the creation of "reality" it taken beyond the pleasure of fantasy.

7. Disease, obesity, failed relationships, and other adverse human conditions are fundamentally a result of dishonesty.

8. Dishonesty is fundamentally a failure to properly perceive and integrate data from the senses into a reasonable and logical framework or hierarchy of values to pursue, hold, promote, or celebrate.

9. Humans are the only animals with the ability to be dishonest with respect to reality and thus, dishonesty with self and others is the fundamental root cause of all disease, inability to flourish and early, unnatural death.

10. Non-human animals exist in various environmental niches they have evolved within to exploit, within a balance. Human animals migrated out of Africa to populate the Earth from equator to arctic and antarctic circle, and sea level to 16,000 feet of elevation, and everything in-between. Thus, human animals evolved to migrate over eons of time to exploit the environment available and along the way.

11. Each human individual has encoded within his genes the ability to survive and thrive on a wide range of food sources from terrestrial, to sea, to tree, to subterranean.

12. Non human animals don't typically become obese (unless by nature, such as in advance of hibernation) or die unnaturally. Humans become obese. Pets become obese. Zoo animals can become obese when zookeepers stray from a naturally appropriate diet.

13. Human animals should not have any difficulty eating a mix of the right natural foods suitable to them, when available, maintaining and enjoying natural health and longevity as a result. Good health is natural. It's not something that needs to be man made, industrialized or drugged.

14. Human animals have developed complex social structures to the extent that a few dominate all the rest, to a level of welcome cheerleading and hand-clapping, such that the few can cleverly and parasitically sustain an unearned livelihood through implicit or explicit threat of force, or more elegantly: promise of reward.

15. Modern human animals developed the propensity to believe they have power through a Neolithic device known as a democratic vote. It actually gives them about equal odds in terms of effective power to buying a lottery ticket. Conversely, we know ancient humans were individually and socially powerful, because they survived on their own. We have the anthropology and we're here. It happened. Nobody voted on it.

16. A domesticated animal can exhibit guilt and shame, but not to the extent that they can possibly sacrifice their well being over it. Human animals invented guilt and shame, and they went on to make a place for it being unbridled and unearned. They invented religion; they conjured "reality" and got everyone to buy onto it and teach it to their offspring. They laid the seeds for control.

17. The guilt and shame works hand in hand with religious fantasies that most notably involve fear. Guilt and shame, combined with irrational fear, to make a malleable human animal who will do his part to see to the livelihood of the parasites. Anciently, it was the parasites of church and now, the parasites of State. The former is voluntary and the latter, compulsory undef threat of prosecution.

18. All humans have within themselves the ability to change everything on a dime.

19. Of self-destruction, of guilt, of shame, of fear: the worst of these is fear. While fear is natural, that's the rub. The Neolithic, above all else, has been a massive story -- fundamentally -- about how to use it to advantage. The Neolithic is above all, a story about how our natural tendencies have been used against us in just about every conceivable way.

We long, long ago -- probably not long after the ink had dried on the Declaration of Independence -- got over the silly idea that there is any such thing as "unalienable rights;" and of course, the US Constitution, by including a "Bill of Rights," forever set in stone the principle that the State is the grantor and the final arbiter of any notion of "rights."

"Rights" are what the various levels of government say they are, nothing more. Not anymore.

Always has, and always will. You can take any number of positions on all of that and it will still happen. There will always be very bad people, and psychopaths. People will still kill people and your choice is to live in bedtime story fantasy about it for comfort's sake, or confront the reality of it.

There will always be killing and murder. Those who propose solutions that involve eradication are deluded, or worse, scamming you. Have you paid them anything or donated?

I have a modest proposal: if you want someone dead, then just kill them yourself.

You see, it's very difficult for me to assume that many people don't want one whole fuck of a lot of people dead. Isn't that part of the reason why so many agitate, then stand in line at a voting booth, to vote death by proxy, "support the troops," and all thayt? Do they go home and wash their hands?

If you want someone dead -- and I'm certainly not saying there's not valid reasons for that -- then kill them yourself.

Hekiganroku case 39 "If you want to know about Buddha Nature, you must pay attention to time and causation."

What Time Is It? May 21, 2010 Famed screenwriter Charlie Kaufman and theoretical physicist Brian Greene dissect time as we know it. What is the smallest unit of time, and what does it look like? For starters, you should stop looking at the clock, and start looking at the universe.

Richard Baker's Dharma Sangha has a retreat center, Johanneshoff in the Black Forest. Students of his have a sitting group in Berlin, one in Munich, and he does workshops in various places every year. I was their guest two years ago and had a great time. I also met with several Tibetan Buddhism groups.Lot's of Sogyul Rimpoche students there though he's based in France. Vanja Palmers has the zendo in the Alps above Lucern, Felsentor, and a place somewhere in Austria. And there's more I can't remember and don't know.